Affectionately Nitpicking Pages and Screens with Equal Enthusiasm
*TW: this post contains discussions relating to abuse/grooming. If you stumble upon this post by accident, I promise, I don’t write about serious subjects like this often. In fact, I prefer to take the easy route most of the time and just have a few laughs with dramas. Anyway, let’s get this over with. It …
At this point in the evolution of C-dramas, when introduced to a show that features a romance between an innocent girl who unknowingly harbors dark energy within her body and a white-robed immortal who becomes her mentor, most people would just steer clear. I, however, was more optimistic despite this drama’s questionable beginning. And the …
Xie Zhiyao is one of the leading protagonists of Meet Yourself. If you are unfamiliar, this drama is about a city career woman, Hongdou, who, after a traumatic experience, retreats to a town far away to take a break and along the way discovers a new way of life. Xie Zhiyao is one of the …
It is about time we came up with a list of tropes that romance fantasy dramas need to move on from, isn’t it? Given how many of those dramas we have gone through and how many have been produced in recent years. Gosh, I can’t even keep up with the speed at which dramas come …
Needless to say, the diversity of female characters is one of Dream of Splendour’s strong suits. The drama is successful in making its viewers empathize with most of its women, especially the leading women. At the helm, we have a fearless Pan’er. When things go wrong, we have San-niang, stable and kind-hearted and always ready …
Xiaoyanzi is the main protagonist of Princess Returning Pearl, a 1998 drama. Not-like-other-girls, rebellious and progressive in a restricted and male-dominated society, Xiaoyanzi was hugely popular when the drama came out. But has she survived the test of time? I’d say: yes, she has. A closer look at the character tells us why she has earned …
Have you ever seen a romantic drama where whenever the lead couple start cuddling, you just start thinking about the other characters instead? Yes, that’s me and Love Between Fairy and Devil. Don’t get me wrong, I like Orchid and Dongfang – to… some extent. But with the drama’s tendency to force-feed its audience sugar, …
As impartial as one might try to be, it is simply impossibly to watch Pillow Book (Eternal love of Dream) without thinking about Donghua and Fengjiu in Ten Miles, because, well, Ten Miles came out first despite it not being an official version. Also, that white hair and purple robe are hard to miss. So, …
Doctors is a K-drama from 1997. You would think that a drama this old is bound to be cringy and unnecessary. There are definitely melodramatic factors about it that we can live without nowadays. But watching it now, I would say that this drama still thrives, mostly due to the bold choices it made in …
One of the great things about the drama Romance in the Rain is that its story and characters are consistent. Consistent enough for you to analyze without having to wonder whether something is the result of bad writing. Well, remember that part where Yiping (Vicky Zhao) jumps off a bridge and Shuhuan (Leo Ku) just …